In Keansburg, looters do more damage

Oct. 30, 2012

Boats scattered like toys. Businesses toppled to the ground. Looters roaming the streets.

The Bayshore suffered its fair share of damage from Hurricane Sandy.

In Keyport, Bob’s Hot Dogs shack toppled to the ground. Across the street, the back wall of Mike’s Submarines Shop ripped off.

In Union Beach, some of the houses that once lined Brook Avenue are gone, torn to shreds. At the corner of Brook and Union avenues, the second story to one house was on the ground, leaning into the Union Avenue roadway. Getting into and around the borough, motorists had to traverse multiple side streets to access the beach area, where Brook Avenue is located.

In Atlantic Highlands, the municipal harbor devoured all its piers, lifting boats out of the water and smacking them down on land like a tumbling stack of dominoes.

“The wind came up with such force, it picked up all the boats and pushed them against the fence and into each other,” Frotton said. “Every pier is gone,” including the fishing pier, several new floating piers and the SeaStreak commuter ferry pier, she said.

The hurricane also destroyed a newly built ice house at On The Deck restaurant and Sissy’s Restaurant downstairs, as well as Shore Casino, all located at the waterfront, she said.

At least 80 boats at the marina were “totaled,” said marina owner Hans Pedersen, who shook his head as he stared at the devastation he estimated would easily cost millions of dollars.

“After we survived the ’92 storm, we figured we could make it through again if we had to,” Pedersen said. “This was four times worse than ’92.”

In Highlands, Jay Cosgrove, owner of Bahrs Landing, was surveying the damage to the lower level of his seafood restaurant. Just outside, Bahrs’ dock on the Shrewsbury River was mangled. A bait house at the dock had washed away.

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“The door was totally sandbagged, but the water breached it and busted the doors,’’ Cosgrove said in the downstairs portion of his restaurant. The rush of water flushed food and supplies right out the door, he said.

Cosgrove said he found a bottle of balsamic vinegar floating outside. The water reached five feet inside the restaurant’s lower level.

In Keansburg, on top of the flooding, water rescues and property damage caused by Hurricane Sandy, some residents are dealing with another adversary: looters.

Many of the arcade machines at Keansburg Amusement Park washed out into the adjoining streets. While some residents took pictures of them, others tried to jimmy them open.

“Hey, what are you doing?” shouted Gary Balaban — who own the arcades — at a man trying to pry open a machine that fell on Beachway on Tuesday afternoon.

“Do you know whose this is?” shouted back the man, whose face was full of tattoos.

“Yeah, it’s mine!” responded Balaban to the man, who moved on. Balaban said he is unsure how much money has been taken.

Keansburg Police Chief James Pigott confirmed there has been looting at the arcades. He said there have been no reports of looting elsewhere in town.

Pigott plans to send officers down to the site periodically, but said the police’s hands are full from dealing with Sandy.

“It’s ridiculous that we have to be babysitting down there,” Pigott said. “I don’t know what it is with people.”

Elsewhere in Keansburg, residents did their best impressions of ballet dancers as they tried to leap over pools of water.

Iris Duran had to wade through thigh-high water to check on how her house is. Many of the roads in the northern end of town were still submerged in water Tuesday afternoon.

“I was a little scared,” said Duran of wading through the water. “It was so cold, and probably full of bacteria, but I tried not to think about it.”

Jerry Dean and several friends collected some of the twigs and other wooden debris washed up by the storm and made a bonfire on a friend’s front yard.

“We’ve got all this wood, so we might as well use it,” said Dean before using an ax to chop up a larger piece.